


Those Days (the days we were inseparable)

by orphan_account



Series: Hearing the Drums [1]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Doctor Who: Academy Era, Gen, Ginger Doctor, Male Friendship, Running
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2014-06-26
Packaged: 2018-01-05 13:36:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1094477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Back when he was eight and he'd only just seen the Vortex, Koschei wasn't insane. But he knew what he was doing. There were several Gallifreyans there that day, and one...caught Koschei's attention. A boy who was trying his hardest not to run.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Boy who Nearly Ran

**Author's Note:**

> I have a lot to explain here :) Here, we have my brainchild, a lovely complicated AU in which the Doctor and the Master used to hear the drums, but it got different reactions from them. Basically disregards everything that was made canon in TEoT, which I am desperately avoiding in my recent discovery of Doctor Who, and disregarding almost everything about the Doctor's past.
> 
> It is also my headcanon that before he left Gallifrey, the Doctor was ginger.
> 
> Oh, and this is probably terrible, seeing as this is some of my first fanfiction for DW.

Koschei calmly continued on into the room, ignoring the few professors that had led him here. If he were being honest with himself, he understood why they had guards of sorts after they'd seen the Vortex. The power he had seen, the pure, untempered energy that coursed through him as he had looked into it was terrifying, and he was shaking a little.

But he felt calm, considering what he had read about the subject, which stated that most people were filled with energy for days.

There was a faint ringing in his ears, and a tiny thrumming in the back of his head, a quiet drumbeat, but Koschei wasn't bothered by it. Not too much, anyway. He felt a little weird, but otherwise, nothing different.

There weren't many boys in the room, most of them chattering excitedly together about how inspired they felt because of the Vortex and what they had seen.

The room was large and comfortable, inscriptions in various languages along the walls. The vast majority of the room was occupied by seats clustered around a single area, and there were a few beds that were curtained off. Koschei could see a few were occupied by some people who had probably been tired out by seeing the Vortex.

There were a few professors who were watching them, not contributing to anything that was going on.

Except in the corner of the room, where one was bent down, probably talking to someone that he couldn't see.

Koschei headed over to find out what was going on. "Excuse me." He said, going over to the professor. "What's going on?"

The professor turned round and frowned at him. "This young man would prefer to be left alone, so withdraw from this area."

A voice rose from behind the professor, "He can stay." The boy sniffed. "And can you please not stand so close?"

The professor looked doubtful, but he moved away from the boy, who Koschei could now see as being hunched with his legs pulled up to his chin, and faint tear tracks down his face. The professor withdrew and sat some distance away, still watching.

Koschei sat down beside the boy, who inched away slightly but stayed put. "Thank you." He said quietly. "I can't stand stuffy professors and I'm reacting even worse now." He smiled a little and swiped a hand at his eyes. "I'm Theta Sigma."

"Koschei." Koschei replied. "Your hair clashes with the red robes."

Theta laughed. "I know."


	2. Fear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happened after seeing the Vortex was something that Theta had never expected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, sorry this took so long. It seems that I never post these damn things, despite the fact that it has been on paper for ages. Well, the chapter after this has been written for ages. I decided to insert a bit in between it and the first chapter.

Theta was terrified. He didn't know why, exactly, but he stared into that Vortex and he was so terrified he was frozen in place. Everything was almost...spinning. Everything was just a little off-centre and it put Theta on edge, coming from a house where everything was completely in one place, and his uncle liked that so much that most of the furniture was locked into place to prevent Theta from moving it.

And then there were people coming closer and he just had to run or something horrible would happen...

He got told off for scaring the other initiates when he burst into the room where they had been waiting. Mass hysteria wasn't good for all of the other eight-year-old Gallifreyans and they had to hold up all of the initiations by half a Gallifreyan hour.

He was bustled into the back room quietly as he tried desperately not to cry. People were staring, and they were all way too close. Why were they so close?

Then he looked again. He focused.

There was no one anywhere near him, but the fear, the terror of them being so close and threatening was still there.

Theta took a few deep breaths and cried. He tried not to make any noise or let anyone see. He was slightly aware that he was in the corner, nowhere left to run, but he couldn't bring himself to care one bit.

Something was wrong. He'd done something wrong and when he looked into the Vortex he became a failure. Brax would be so disappointed in him. They were meant to be disproving the rumours that they weren't as good as everyone else because of their heritage. But because of this, Brax would be hindered too, because he'd failed and the Vortex had changed him. Had made him worse, not inspired.

"Theta Sigma." A man spoke in a low voice and Theta jumped, looking up to see a professor standing over him. Theta flinched and very nearly let out a squeak of fear. "What is going on?"

Theta took a deep breath and tried to speak, finding himself almost paralysed in fear and unable to speak. He felt disconnected from the fear. It was there, it was very, very there and imminent and in his face, but he was thinking separate from it. He couldn't say anything. He shook his head and tried to shrink further into the corner.

"Theta Sigma. Focus." The man said again.

Theta tried to. He really tried. But nothing was working. He couldn't get the relative order in his mind to translate into his head.

And then the pounding in his head that he had hardly been aware of intensified and he clutched his head. He could vaguely make out the worried face of the professor in front of him, and further away, another person in initiate robes coming closer to him.

"Excuse me." The other initiate asked. Male. "What's going on?"

The professor turned around and Theta felt his mind relax. "This young man would prefer to be left alone, so withdraw from this area."

Theta felt a spike of annoyance at the professor. He didn't know that. And this other initiate wasn't exactly making him feel any worse. Better, maybe. "He can stay." Theta decided, sniffing. "And can you please not stand so close?" He asked, quieter.

To Theta's delight, the professor moved away and he could see a whole view of the other initiate. Quite tall, but probably not as tall as him, with dark brown hair a little more in a Time Lord style and colour than his own bright red, perpetually scruffy hair.

The boy sat down next to him, a little too close, and Theta moved away slightly, but didn't leave, despite wanting to run very much. "Thank you." He mumbled. "I can't stand stuffy professors and I'm reacting even worse now." He felt suddenly self-concious of the tears streaking his face, and he swiped a hand at them half-heartedly before introducing himself. "I'm Theta Sigma."

"Koschei." The boy replied, smiling at him. "Your hair clashes with the red robes." He commented.

Theta laughed, the fear decreasing slightly. "I know."


	3. Sent Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happens after that night was something Theta never wanted to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well guess what! The pc broke. Yay. Though it does mean I can write a lot more often and without being seen. And...this chapter was not in the original draft either, because I decided that the next chapter was too brief and I should do something better.

A little later, after all the initiates had looked into the Vortex and had been given half a Gallifreyan hour to calm down, they were sent to a large dormitory which would be their room for the next ten years, before they were moved to the higher school.

Theta could not settle. All these people, pressed around him, all there and too close and dangerous. There was horrible thrumming in the back of his head that had just not gone away since Koschei had rescued him from that professor. Every time someone moved it disturbed any form of rest he had managed to reach.

By the time the first sun started to rise in the sky (theoretically. Theta knew that the suns didn't actually rise), he was a nervous wreak, more of one than he had been before he went to bed.

And when the professors came to get them up, he dissolved into tears because he just couldn't take it at all.

\---

He was sent home to try and calm down before the academic year actually started. It was a disgrace. The only comfort Theta could draw from the situation was that he wasn't the only one to be sent home. The others had been so tired out that they had not woken up that morning when shaken.

Brax was rightly disappointed in him. He knew that he had failed his brother and most likely ruined his future. Brax had desperately wanted to be such a good Time Lord that with the right connections he would ascend to be a politician and reach the High Council. Theta didn't really understand his brother's need for power.

He couldn't even face his brother. He was far too scared to do that. He just hid up in his room, hardly moving, jumping at every noise and trying desperately to close his mind to the fear.

At least the pounding had stopped, replaced by a dull ache that wouldn't go away.


	4. Lonely

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Theta grows up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter. This one will overview those ten years before the Higher Academy, and then, next chapter, they'll actually talk to each other.

Theta went back to the Academy a few days later, tired and having received a very stern speech from his uncle about behaving, not being too strange and trying to make connections with other Houses if he could, and to make sure that he didn't get too friendly with someone from the Oakdown House or various other Houses that Theta couldn't be bothered to remember. He probably wouldn't make any friends anyway.

There wasn't much new, though the fear was a lot better now. He was kept in the group room with everyone else, expected to be back to normal now. And he was a little back to his normal, but not completely, and he wasn't even normal by Gallifreyan standards anyway.

But he was trying, even if it hurt all the time to stand close to everyone and act like a good little Prydonian to all his curious classmates.

He didn't quite understand why they were curious about him. They seemed to want to know why he ran, and when he said that he didn't know, they sort of ignored him, but they still wanted to know about his every movement.

Eventually it started to grate on his nerves a bit and it started wearing him down. He retreated into the shadows, not willing to say a word to anyone about anything anymore.

He didn't know why he felt that way. He just did and it was so, so tiring to talk to people, he just didn't want to make the effort anymore.

He moved to sit alone in the lecture halls. He took impeccable notes and understood every word spoken in the classes, studying extra material in his out of class retreat of the library.

He matured, physically if not mentally (he still had the urges to run and make mischief (and he really wanted to go outside of the Capitol, but the only time he saw anyone do that, they were blue-robed people everyone completely ignored and refused to speak about, and if they did it was to scorn them)). That bright red hair that had always clashed so badly with his robes had darkened considerably, and was more of the Prydonian red he wore. He was no longer a child, and he knew that, but he still felt like one. He still felt like the trapped child, trapped in a society so much bigger than himself.

It was a lot easier, if lonely. Sometimes he would catch a glimpse of Koschei, talking and laughing with other people, often Ushas, but he never persued the friendship that was now a decade behind them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd like a beta, or at least someone to talk to? I like talking to fandom people, especially those who are interested in Academy Era or Classic Who. My email is Ilovebookssomuch@hotmail.co.uk


End file.
